


October

by alcibiades



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: M/M, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-02
Updated: 2014-05-02
Packaged: 2018-01-21 14:25:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1553588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alcibiades/pseuds/alcibiades
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the second week of October, autumn hit the midwestern United States with a vengeance; the temperature dropped from seventy degrees to fifty overnight. It was as if Mother Nature had abruptly realized that she had some catching up to do, having suddenly taken notice of the fact that the trees had already exploded in a riot of orange and yellow and, despite the unseasonably warm weather, dropped half their leaves. Arthur didn't mind; the summer had seemed interminable, unbearably hot and humid wherever in either hemisphere work had taken him this year, and fall had always been his favorite season anyway.</p><p>Other members of the current team he was working with did not share his affection for cooler weather.</p>
            </blockquote>





	October

In the second week of October, autumn hit the midwestern United States with a vengeance; the temperature dropped from seventy degrees to fifty overnight. It was as if Mother Nature had abruptly realized that she had some catching up to do, having suddenly taken notice of the fact that the trees had already exploded in a riot of orange and yellow and, despite the unseasonably warm weather, dropped half their leaves. Arthur didn't mind; the summer had seemed interminable, unbearably hot and humid wherever in either hemisphere work had taken him this year, and fall had always been his favorite season anyway.

Other members of the current team he was working with did not share his affection for cooler weather. They had rented both sides of a duplex for the month it would take to complete the job, and it had somehow ended up being divided by sex. Arthur found that particular decision to be hilariously reminiscent of middle school, but the women had somehow agreed that sharing a bathroom with each other was far preferable to sharing one with either Arthur or Eames. 

Eames was, in all actuality, a fine person to share a bathroom with. He also, however, seemed to believe that he was some sort of tropical bird of paradise, and that he might seriously _die_ if not relocated to warmer climes. He had called the landlord twice in the past week, and was currently sitting on the living room sofa with Arthur, threatening to harass the poor woman a third time.

"It's not going to happen," Arthur said, not looking up from his computer screen. How could you seriously justify spending that much money on _hockey?_ "They don't turn the boilers on until it's been below fifty degrees at least three days in a row, and it's definitely not below fifty degrees right now."

Eames was wearing an enormously ugly orange, nubbly wool sweater which did absolutely _nothing_ for him, and a pair of plaid trousers which genuinely looked like they had seen better days. "Dressing like a homeless person isn't going to keep you warm," Arthur continued, and then, pointedly glancing down at Eames's bare feet, "but wearing socks might."

"I didn't pack socks," Eames replied, with a stubborn set to his jaw that Arthur knew all too well. It was that same look he got when informed he couldn't or shouldn't do something. Given that Arthur was often the one foisting such pronouncements on Eames, he felt like he was almost on intimate terms with that particular facial expression.

"It's October," Arthur said mildly.

"I'm going to Sydney after this." Eames flipped a piece of paper over and scanned the back, presumably reading the points Arthur had highlighted earlier. "I'm going to take that job with Reyes --"

"Reyes is a hack," Arthur interjected, adding an annotation to his PDF. 

"A hack who pays very well," Eames countered, "And who will be working somewhere lovely and warm. I'm sure he'd love to have you on point."

"I'm sure he would," Arthur agreed. "Now shut up and let me read." 

Eames gave him a wounded look, eyebrow eloquently raised. It was a lovely moue, Arthur thought, as Eames wormed his bare feet (they were cold as ice) under Arthur's leg.

That night, while Shardai was busy working with Eames on the forgery, Arthur left them with Carina watching over them and went to Target. He bought Eames a six-pack of wool socks and the most repugnant fleece throw he could find. It was hot pink and it had Barbie on it. 

"I think I'm meant to be offended by what this blanket implies you believe about my person," Eames said, upon examining the contents of the bag Arthur had lobbed at his head. Arthur sat down on the sofa and turned the TV on, switching the channel to Comedy Central. The Daily Show was just coming on. "But instead I can't help but be grateful for the concern you've shown," Eames continued. He scooted up closer to Arthur on the couch. 

Arthur turned the volume up on the Daily Show and ignored it completely when Eames's leg pressed against his and their shoulders came to rest together. As ridiculous a picture as it was, after Eames had put the socks on and spread the throw out over himself, he looked disarmingly content. 

Arthur went to bed early that night, intending to catch up on the sleep debt which loomed constantly over his shoulder while he had the opportunity. Sometime in the middle of the night, he woke to a faint sliver of light and the sound of someone shuffling into his room. He realized, logic narrowing down the suspects to only one after only a moment, that it must be Eames. He had been reaching for the knife slipped under his mattress before he'd even awoken fully, and he slipped his hand back out, empty, his brain struggling to shake the haze of sleep off, as Eames settled behind him.

He should have made Eames go back to his own room, but Eames was incredibly warm, and despite the ribbing Arthur had been giving Eames regarding proper temperate seasons, it was actually kind of chilly in the duplex. Eames's breath puffed hot against the back of Arthur's neck, and his arm came up around Arthur's chest. Arthur didn't kick him out. He just went back to sleep.

Eames barely stirred at five thirty when Arthur's alarm went off. Arthur spared him a glance for a moment as he was pulling his running shorts on, looking at the way his lashes rested against his cheeks and his mouth went slack in sleep, even though he'd seen it dozens of times before, when Eames was hooked up to the PASIV. It seemed different this time - worth remembering. Arthur reached down, on impulse, and brushed Eames's hair back off his forehead.

He put his hood up and went outside. It was cold and he could taste the first bloom of something that might be frost in the air. When he inhaled he felt somehow bigger, like the air in his lungs had expanded him in more ways than one. He ran around the lake, through the leaves that hadn't yet been swept aside by other runners' feet, and felt really _good,_ for the first time in a while.

Eames was in the shower when he got back, and Arthur went into the kitchen to make a pot of coffee. The French press was the real reason Arthur had gone to Target last night, having decided he was fed up with the shitty drip coffee maker that had come furnished in the duplex. Two minutes into steeping the coffee, he heard Eames pad into the kitchen. This could be awkward, he thought. It could be awkward, or it could be…not. "I think I've figured out why you're always cold," Arthur said. "It's because you're busy putting out body heat like a furnace."

Eames chuckled low in his throat and stepped closer. "Making something as dark and bitter as your soul, are you?" he asked, resting his chin on Arthur's shoulder.

"It's Kenya AA," Arthur answered. His eyebrow quirked. He could smell shower gel and aftershave. Eames's arms went around him, warm, and gave a little squeeze.

"Did you know," Eames murmured, "that there's a kind of coffee, which can only exist after being first ingested by a civet, in the form of a berry, and then being excreted? Men wander through the forests of Indonesia to quite literally collect dung, and make it into the most expensive coffee in the world."

"Yes," Arthur said, eyes fixed on the kitchen timer, pressing the coffee. "I did know that, actually."

"Of course you did," Eames agreed, fitting himself against Arthur's back. "I don't suppose you bought any tea, while you were out last night."

"Aren't you capable of doing that for yourself?" Arthur asked. There was a tea shop literally down the street from the duplex, and even if Eames couldn't drive in this country, he could certainly walk a block in the fall air without turning into a toad.

Eames huffed out a little laugh. "Yes, I suppose so," he said. "But I _do_ like it when you do things for me."

"You don't have to act like a helpless baby to get me to do that," Arthur countered, pouring himself a mug of coffee. "I hear asking works just fine. Can you let me go so I can get the milk?" 

Eames released him and stepped away. "May I have a mug of your coffee, lovely Arthur?" he asked Arthur; without looking, Arthur could still sense the smirk he was wearing, even past the veneer of polite withdrawal in his tone. 

"Yeah, of course," Arthur said, putting a dollop of milk into his coffee and taking it back into the living room.

They somehow both ended up back on the couch rather than sitting at the perfectly serviceable dining room table, and Eames spread his Barbie throw out to cover Arthur's feet, too. After his first cup of coffee, Arthur headed for the shower. Emerging from the steamy heat of the bathroom into the distinctly cool air of the hall between bedrooms, he was forced to admit that Eames was probably right, and the landlord should really turn the heat on.

Even dressed again in a long-sleeved shirt and a sweater, Arthur was regrettably chilly. Eames, who had no qualms about -- anything, apparently -- was wearing flannel pajama pants, wool socks, and that same orange sweater, and he looked warm. Much warmer than Arthur, whose sweater was also wool, but a much thinner variety, and less hideously ugly. 

Apparently Arthur was projecting the fact that he was cold, or maybe it was just Eames, as usual, being more perceptive even than Arthur gave him credit for. Either way, he fitted himself against Arthur's side immediately, and resettled the throw to cover them both. They sat like that for a while, drinking coffee, while Arthur went through his e-mails for the day. One from Tyler, in Buenos Aires, complaining about Ariadne, who she'd hired on Arthur's recommendation; it made Arthur laugh, and Eames too, when Arthur showed it to him. 

Arthur was waiting to hear from Shardai, who was downtown doing some reconnaissance, but after two hours the only message he'd received from her was a text that said _Did you know there's a statue of Mary Tyler Moore down here?!_ ( _Yes,_ he had sent back) and he began to despair the idea of anything ever getting done today.

Eames had shifted so that his feet were up on the arm of the couch and his shoulders and head were pressed against Arthur. It should probably have been uncomfortable, and should almost certainly have counted as an invasion of personal space, but the fact of the matter was that Arthur had known Eames even longer than he had known Dom Cobb. 

While most people tended to mistake their mutual antagonism for something other than what it was, truthfully, Arthur knew just as much as Eames had to, that it was less cockfighting than it was a comfortable rhythm. Both of them liked to be challenged, after all. He shifted a little, turning slightly so that Eames's head was in his lap, and absently carded his fingers through Eames's hair as he went over billing statements again.

By two in the afternoon, they still hadn't heard from Shardai. It was the laziest Arthur had been in recent memory, and he somehow found himself dozing off (the sleep debt he had been running from and his Circadian rhythm trying to tell him it was nap time, no doubt) with his headphones on, listening to wiretap they'd obtained from a particularly shady lawyer.

Eames was watching a half-hour long video of the girl he was forging at her ninth birthday party, over and over. Whenever Arthur looked at him, he was replaying five-second segments, ostensibly memorizing subtle movements, sometimes echoing them vaguely with his own body.

Arthur let his eyes fall closed. _And you knew that your husband was bringing in more income than seemed feasible, given his current position?_ the prosecutor was asking. And then Arthur was blinking awake, realizing that his headphones were askew and he was lying half-in Eames's lap. Eames had apparently abandoned the laptop and was dozing too, his fingers occasionally moving against the back of Arthur's neck. 

Arthur shifted, inhaling, and as he did Eames startled fully awake, turning to look at Arthur. "Arthur," he said.

"Yes," Arthur replied, sitting up slightly and straightening his hair. His voice was creaky from sleep.

"This doesn't make you uncomfortable, does it? It's not invasive?" Eames asked. His tone was that respectfully-testing-limits one; he rarely used it with Arthur.

Arthur shook his head. "No," he said. He squinted at Eames, took his headphones off, and set them aside, on the coffee table. He felt warm and sleepy, and _safe_ , perversely enough. It made him feel younger than he had felt in a long time. 

"All right, then," Eames said decisively, settling back down against the back of the couch. Arthur blinked at him, studying him for a moment, and then settled back down as well, curling up with his head in Eames's lap and falling asleep until his phone buzzed with Shardai's call.

The boilers were turned on the next day, but he and Eames slept in the same bed for the rest of the job anyway.


End file.
